Ladies of the Lights

Michigan Women in the U.S. Lighthouse Service

Patricia Majher

Publication Year: 2011

"A great read about some great ladies, Pat Majher's Ladies of the Lights pays long overdue homage to an overlooked part of Great Lakes maritime history in which a select group of stalwart women beat the odds to succeed in a field historically reserved for men." ---Terry Pepper, Executive Director of Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association Michigan once led the country in the number of lighthouses, and they're still a central part of the mystique and colorful countryside of the state. What even the region's lighthouse enthusiasts might not know is the rich history of female lighthouse keepers in the area. Fifty women served the sailing communities on Lakes Huron, Michigan, and Superior, as well as on the Detroit River, for more than 100 years. From Catherine Shook, who raised eight children while maintaining the Pointe Aux Barques light at the entrance to Saginaw Bay; to Eliza Truckey, who assumed responsibility for the lighthouse in Marquette while her husband fought for four years in the Civil War; to Elizabeth Whitney, whose combined service on Beaver Island and in Harbor Springs totaled forty-one years---the stories of Michigan's "ladies of the light" are inspiring. This is no technical tome documenting the minutiae of Michigan's lighthouse specifications. Rather, it's a detailed, human portrait of the women who kept those lighthouses running, defying the gender expectations of their time. Patricia Majher is Editor of Michigan History magazine, published by the Historical Society of Michigan. Prior, she was Assistant Director of the Michigan Women's Historical Center and Hall of Fame in Lansing, Michigan. In addition, she has been writing both advertising and editorial copy for almost thirty years and has been a frequent contributor to Michigan newspapers and magazines.

Cover

Title Page and Copyright

Contents

Acknowledgments

I wish to thank the Michigan Women’s Historical Center and Hall of
Fame for providing the opportunity to delve into such a fascinating
topic in the process of developing the “Ladies of the Lights: Michigan
Women in the U.S. Lighthouse Service” exhibit. The discovery of an...

Introduction

Lighthouse keeping in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries
was a rugged life ‹lled with long hours and hard work punctuated by
periods of real peril. Not a profession for the fainthearted, it was
thought by many to be unsuitable employment for the “fairer sex.”...

1. Female Lighthouse Keepers: A Brief History

The story begins in the early eighteenth century, with the illumination
of the inaugural “aid to navigation” in U.S. waters: Little Brewster
Island lighthouse in Boston Harbor. First lit in 1716, it was
manned—literally—by a fellow known as George Worthylake.1 Ten...

2. Michigan: Home to the Most Female Keepers

By extension, Michigan also recorded the most keepers in the
Lighthouse Service and earned another distinction as well: It was
home to the most female keepers. Twenty-seven of the state’s women
served as principal keepers out of approximately 140 across the country.
Another twenty-five Michigan...

3. Typical Duties of a Lighthouse Keeper

To fully appreciate the challenges that women faced in the light keeping
profession, you must ‹rst understand what any keeper or assistant
keeper was expected to do. The following excerpt from an 1835 document
issued by the superintendent of lighthouses details just a few of...

4. How Did Women Get Appointed to Keeper Positions?

The wives (and sometimes daughters) of keepers had little trouble being
named assistant keepers in the Lighthouse Service; if their relatives
requested the appointment, it was generally granted. But getting
a woman named the principal keeper at a light? That was another...

5. What Drew Women to This Work?

It’s a sad fact, but true: Most women became lighthouse keepers to
provide for themselves and their children after the death of a keeper
husband.1 And some were relatives of keepers who just fell naturally
into the profession. One example of this was Caroline Warner—an...

6. What Special Hardships Did Women Face?

Some lighthouses were built in the most remote places. M. A.
Stevens bravely took on Michigan’s most distant assignment when
she assisted her husband, William Stevens, at the Menagerie Island
(Isle Royale) lighthouse fifty miles out in Lake Superior. Far from...

7. Were Any Female Keepers Also Mothers?

Many female lighthouse keepers performed their professional duties
while raising children, and some had very large families. Among
Michigan’s most notable keepers who were also mothers are Catherine
Shook with eight children and Katherine Marvin with ten....

8. Were Female Keepers Treated Differently from Male Keepers?

It was definitely a man’s world in the Lighthouse Service of the nineteenth
century. For instance, while men could serve at any light station,
women were more restricted in their movements—for their own
safety. An 1879 circular from Naval Secretary George Dewey to all...

9. What Were the Contributions of Wives of Male Keepers?

A keeper’s wife’s primary responsibility was maintaining their
residence to the same exacting standards as those of the lighthouse itself.
The service’s inspectors visited each light station on a quarterly
basis to review the performance of the keeper as well as the condition...

10. How Long Did Female Keepers Serve?

The 1870s marked the high point of employment of women in Michigan
lighthouses, with numbers declining sharply after 1898. In the
twentieth century, only thirteen women served the maritime community;
of those, nine appeared to be “placeholders” who stayed only a...

11. Sixteen Who Served

More than fifty women served at Michigan lighthouses as assistant
keepers or keepers starting in 1849 and ending in 1954. While all
were dedicated to their jobs, sixteen served with particular distinction.
Here are their stories, in order of their first year of official service...

12. An Interview with Frances (Wuori Johnson) Marshall

What follows is an excerpted version of an oral history interview conducted
in 2007 with Michigan’s last female lighthouse keeper Frances
Marshall. She served at the White River light on Lake Michigan. The
interviewer is the author....

13. Epilogue

For most Michigan women, though, the record of their lives
after lighthouse keeping is incomplete. After assisting her husband
Stephen for ‹ve years at Gull Rock light, Mary Cocking ceases to
show up in service records. It is thought that she moved with him...

Welcome to Project MUSE

Use the simple Search box at the top of the page or the Advanced Search linked from the top of the page to find book and journal content. Refine results with the filtering options on the left side of the Advanced Search page or on your search results page. Click the Browse box to see a selection of books and journals by: Research Area, Titles A-Z, Publisher, Books only, or Journals only.